Love and Kisses Chicken

Cooking a meal for someone you love can be a far more intimate experience than going to a restaurant. Here’s a clip from the wonderful film Like Water For Chocolate, to show the effect good food can have on body and soul!

Today’s dish doesn’t feature quail, as the film clip does, but the recipe did win a prize 30 years ago for the woman who invented it and gave it this highly romantic name! That woman was Anne Bedard, formerly of Vancouver, Canada, and now living in Bedford, Nova Scotia, a suburb of Halifax. I’ll be making her recipe (with only a slight modification by me) for Ron on Valentine’s Day! Anne suggests serving it with wild rice and fresh green beans. I plan to do exactly that! Her lovely recipe serves two.

Love and Kisses Chicken:

To Prepare the Chicken:

2 tbsp. butter

1 large chicken breast, skinless, boneless, halved lengthwise

¼ c. brandy, divided

4 sheets phyllo pastry

3 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted

¼ c. chopped, toasted walnuts

¼ tsp. nutmeg

⅛ tsp. cinnamon

Melt butter in medium saucepan. Brown halved chicken breast over medium-high heat about 10 min. Gently warm 2 tbsp. of brandy in a small sauce pan. With stove-top fan off, carefully ignite brandy, pouring over chicken. Remove pan from heat, shaking gently until flames die down. Remove chicken from pan and keep warm. Reserve brandy in pan to prepare sauce; set aside.

Lay two sheets of phyllo pastry on clean work surface. Cover remaining pastry with dry tea towel to prevent phyllo from drying out. Brush with melted butter. Lay remaining two sheets of phyllo on top and brush again with melted butter. Cut phyllo in half, lengthwise. Place halved chicken breast on each halved phyllo, about 2 in. from one end. Combine walnuts, nutmeg, and cinnamon in small bowl. Sprinkle half of walnut mixture over each halved breast. 

Preheat oven to 400 deg. F. Fold phyllo over chicken, tucking in sides and sealing ends. Bake, seam-side down, 20-to-25 min. 

To Prepare the Sauce:

1-to-2 tsp. Dijon-style mustard

⅓ c. chicken bouillon

¼ c. apple juice

½ c. heavy cream

1 medium Granny Smith apple

While chicken bakes, warm reserved brandy mixture in sauce pan. Whisk in mustard, deglazing pan by scraping up the browned bits of chicken. Add chicken bouillon and apple juice, simmering 5 min. Whisk in heavy cream, cooking on medium heat until sauce begins to thicken. Peel and slice apple, adding to sauce 5 min. before serving. Pass sauce separately, serving over chicken.